Family and Scrapbooking

Guest Author - Kathleen Rensel

One of the main reasons so many people do scrapbooks is to create a place where the focus is on family and recording the history or memories of the family.

Scrapbooking can be combined with genealogy. Thatís real family history and it can go way back. Layouts might be about the entire family tree or maybe about each member on the tree. Just think how fun it would be to have a page or layout for each person Ė including their vital statistics (birth date/place, marriage, children, siblings, residences, death date/place), their photo and maybe a story or two about them. Even if they donít know much about the person, it can be filled with the scrapbookerís feelings.

Most scrapbookers start with the present (or just go back a couple of generations.) And thatís great! It is still a picture in time. They say when writing, the writer should write about what they know. That could definitely apply here. The direction is to scrapbook the part of the story that is known by the scrapbooker.

Scrapbooking can record the general moments too. Family albums might record birthdays or Christmases, weddings or school achievements. They might record not so good moments too. Even every day things can be worth recording as part of the family history.

Albums can help bring a family together and help children know their heritage. The album itself holds many single special memories. It may be all the family birthday photos. It could show the growth of children, or just a growing family, in general. When the members of the family see how everything is put together and a story is told, it brings everything into focus.

Think about this for a moment (an incident that happened recently) what if it were the end of someoneís life? The person is lying in a hospital bed, maybe not even conscious. The doctors ask her family if she has any end of life directions. They are talking about life support, but what about the history? Maybe the patient has not completed their scrapbooks or even had the chance to start them. How awful would that be? How much family history would be lost if the patient doesnít survive?

There is real meaning and real history in scrapbooking. Itís not always super serious, but it is important. It tells the family story or even just portions of the story. It is meant to be shared, especially among family.